Political Regimes and Politicians’ Behavior: Evidence from Mexican Legislators

• In Event: Autocratic Institutions and Elite Control

Abstract

Democracies and dictatorships are believed to generate very different incentives for politicians, as their careers, opportunities and even lives are subject to dissimilar principals. However, systematic evidence on whether the same individuals behave differently under different regimes is still absent. We investigate this issue with data from Mexico between 1988 and 2009, treating the first electoral defeat of the ruling PRI in the 2000 presidential election as our critical intervention. Specifically, we look at within-individual variation to examine whether PRI legislators who served both before and after 2000 changed their responsiveness to voters or party leaders, as well as their propensity to submit geographically targeted legislation, after the democratic transition. We further exploit the fact that Mexico’s democratization proceeded at different paces in different states to determine whether it was national or subnational democratization that mattered the most.

Authors

• Adrian Lucardi, ITAM

• Juan Pablo Micozzi, Instituto Tecnologico Autonomo de Mexico